The theme, “Surviving and Thriving: Gender, Justice, Power, and Place Making,” emphasizes the role of gender in rural community formation and survival. It allows for exploration of the ways that gendered identity (as women, men, or bi- and trans-) and raced identity (within separatist communities, segregated neighborhoods, or integrated spaces) affected personal power, individual choice, and community development. These subjects lend themselves to exploration of rural activism, business development, cultural expression, self-governance, and collective experiences—both historical and contemporary—locally, regionally, nationally, and globally.

RWSA is an international association founded in 1997 to promote and advance farm and rural women’s/gender studies in a historical perspective by encouraging research, promoting scholarship, and establishing and maintaining links with organizations that share these goals. RWSA welcomes academic scholars, public historians and archivists, graduate students, and representatives of rural organizations and communities as conference participants and members.

Presentations take many forms at RWSA conferences, including workshops, panel sessions, tours, interactive sessions, roundtable discussions, poster presentations, open-mic discussions, performances, readings, and audiovisual presentations. The RWSA encourages inter-, trans- or multi-disciplinary approaches that connect rural women’s/gender history and present-day political, ecological, or social and economic concerns, worldwide. The RWSA seeks to integrate creative work with the conference theme, and we encourage artists working in visual, film, performative, and literary genres to submit their ideas to make the conference most dynamic.

The theme: Surviving and Thriving encourages exploration of several sub-themes: • coping with change using creative and alternative strategies

For information on travel grants and letters of invitation, contact Katherine Jellison <jellison@ohio.edu>. For additional information on the RWSA, please go to the organization website, http://www.ohio.edu/history/rwsa/